Feed a Cold, Sweat Out a Cold

I do not own an Instant Pot or its earlier ancestor, the crock pot.  I have owned crock pots of various sizes, but I rarely used them to cook my dinner while I was away--no, I used them as big warming bowls.

Yesterday as I sat at my desk, feeling my cold trying to take over, I thought about the turkey carcasses I brought home with me from our Thanksgiving dinners.  Last night, I made stock.  And this morning, I made a mushroom barley soup with the stock.  We'll reheat it when I get home.  It will be delicious.

Will it make our colds go away?  I did put a lot of garlic in it, but I think that time is the only thing that will make our colds go away.

We had a similar conversation in spin class this morning.  Yesterday someone used the spin room and was coughing so much that the director of the Wellness Center came in to make sure the guy was O.K.  He said he was trying to burn a cold out of his body. 

My spin class was aghast, but I understood the thinking, even if there's no science behind the idea.  If I work hard and sweat, maybe the germs will wash away or not be able to survive the internal heat I'm generating.

We disinfected the bikes and burned our way through class.  On the way back home, I heard news reports of the new corona virus that's burning its way through China; we now have more people infected with this new virus than those infected with SARS during the 2002-2003 outbreak.  The World Health Organization will meet today.  If we were characters in a movie, ominous music would be playing.

Of course, most years the regular old flu will kill more of us than other illnesses.  So I'm washing my hands more than usual and trying not to touch my eyes, nose, or mouth.  I didn't realize how much I touch my mucous membranes until I started trying to be aware every time my fingers strayed to my face.

Making this harder:  my left eye is goopy--it could be part of the cold I'm fighting off, or it could be allergies.  I've been to an eye doctor once during a full-on outbreak of eye goopiness, and it's not an infection.  I might have a blocked sinus tube or it may be the way I'm responding to a new-at-midlife allergy to something.  I do tend to get the goopiness regularly this time of year.

It's the time of year when I'm reminded of the struggles that come from having a body:  post-holiday weight gain that isn't magically vanishing, a cold that wants to take over, achy joints. 

But it could be worse.  I'm always aware of how much worse it could be.

With this new corona virus, I hope we're not all about to find out how much worse it could be.